Live Lake Forest

This bank-owned property is agressively priced and will actually come close to carrying as an investment property.  It’s a nice 2 bedroom, 1 bath, condo in the Le Parc development and has a single car detached garage.  It last sold 13 months ago, December, 2006 for $378,000 but is now owned by a bank and offered at $187,500! 

I haven’t seen it yet, but am familiar with the floorplan and believe it could rent for $1200 – $1400 per month.  At this price, it should sell by Tuesday.    The HOA dues of $262 cover exterior maintenance, insurance, and provide 3 pools within the development.   Property taxes should be approximately 1% per year.  This should qualify for 3% down FHA financing, so check with your lender and add up the payments – it should come very close in a rent vs buy comparison! 

[Added 3 hours later]  I went over to see it, and it’s not too bad.   (Click on the photo to see a larger version.)  The interior needs some work, but it has 2 real bedrooms (not 1 + loft) and a bath between the bedrooms.  The kitchen is small but functional, and the living room has a fireplace.  Overall, it’s one of the better values on the market in Orange County today.

This is a 5 minute video that does a terrific job of explaining what has happended to the mortgage market in the last few years.  

Dan Green of The Mortgage Reports produced this video.

Now, if someone could just come up with the answer to “Where do we go from here?”, we would all be happy!

Total sales volume of homes in Orange County, California, for 2007 was off about 28% from the volume of 2006, but it was off 56% from our record year of 2003!

I really believe that the volume of 2004 is understated because homes were selling so fast that many never made it in to the MLS at all! 

What kind of volume will we see in 2008?  Leave your guess in the comment section and I’ll buy the winner a cup of coffee (or a beer – your choice) next January when we know the answer!

If you would like to see what is currently for sale, go to my search page!

The Lake Forest real estate market is pretty quiet right now, and I don’t expect it to pick up much before our traditional spring start of the home buying season – Super Bowl Sunday, which will be February 3rd this year.

The condo prices start at $189,900 for a one-bedroom bank-owned home.  A two-bedroom is also available from a bank for $209,900 and the least expensive three-bedroom is priced at $289,900.  There are a total of 152 condos and townhomes available today. 

Single family homes now total 192, with prices ranging from $449,900 up to $1.8 million.  There are currently 14 houses priced under $500,000 and 15 homes priced over $900,000.  Ten of the properties at the high end are on the Lake Forest II lake front, and the others are in either the Montbury Estates neighborhood or Normandale Heights. 

The current available inventory is a little lower today than over the most recent few months, due mostly to lots of listings that expired or were withdrawn the last few days of the year.  Many of these will probably come back on the market as “new listings” within a few weeks – many with a new listing agent and a new price.  Out of the 350 actives, the distressed segment of the market makes up about 40%, with 39 homes that have been foreclosed, and 101 that are offered as “short sales” and require bank approval to sell for less than the current owners owe on their mortgage.

If you are considering selling your Lake Forest home, or any other home in Southern California, you need to make sure it is priced at today’s value and forget about what your neighbor sold for in 2005!  The mortgage market has tightened up, and the rare buyers who can qualify for a loan are pickier than ever!

Note : I will be adding my year end review of the 2007 Lake Forest real estate market in about a week to allow time for all the end-of-the-year closings to be reported to the MLS. 

To search Lake Forest, or any other area in Orange County, please check my search page.

I’m taking the day off from real blogging or doing anything with real estate today so I can devote my attention to cheering for my alma mater (USC) in the Rose Bowl.  Although it is still overcast and cool right now, the weather report calls for a high today of 75 degrees in Pasadena, which should inspire a lot of football fans in the colder climates to make the decision to move to California!  This would be a very good thing for our market!     

In the next few days, I will be posting my 2008 plans and goals, and a final wrap-up analysis of the 2007 real estate market in Lake Forest and South Orange County. 

Fight On!